The Risqué Target (18 page)

He scanned her face, and she knew what he saw. Her admiration.

“No one should care for me because I care for no one. I like it that way. Tenderness is dangerous. If you want to fuck, fine. Even now I could bend you over this table and fuck the living hell out of you. That’s all I can give you, but I want it.” He pulled her closer, his hot breath tingling on her lips. He held her shocked gaze for a moment. “Do you want that, sweetheart?”

Oh my God!
She realized she was going to give in. He was not the bomber, not a cold-blooded killer, and she was falling for him. There was nothing she could do to stop it.

But he’d killed Gabe.

She lowered her shamed eyes and whispered, “No,” but her betraying heart shouted, “
YES
!”

“Then don’t touch me that way. Do not tempt me,” he warned, releasing her from his tight grip. He left the room without another word.

The warmth in her eyes haunted him. Tantum straightened his arms, his palms pressed into the floor, his toes stiff against the hardwood. He quickened the push-ups, needing to expel the pent-up anger from his body. It would have been so much easier if she were responsible for the bombs, but all along, in the back of his head, he always knew Nala Dekker was not a killer.

Now he had to work side by side with her to find out the truth. He couldn’t let her go. That was far too dangerous, with two attempts already made on her life.
Why are they after Nala?
And what about him? He’d thought the Mexican drug cartel was chasing him down, but he couldn’t figure them for this frame-up. Whoever was behind this, they must not find out that he and Nala had joined forces. If they realized his need to protect her, they would certainly use her as bait to get to him.

He grunted as he counted in his head.
123. 124.
He thrust his heavy body steadily up and down in the strenuous rhythm of the push-ups, trying to push himself to think harder.

To think about anything except Nala.

Damn it!
He should've ripped open her shirt, taken her breasts into his hands and bit her nipples good and hard in trade for her tender touches. He tried not to remember her response to that at the hotel, the way she cried out with pleasure. The very thought of that maddening little sound gave him an instant hard-on. He wanted to hear it again. He wanted to bury his hands in her long tresses, drag her down between his legs and fill that soft, hot mouth of hers with his cock. The imagined vibration of her moans prickled along his pulsating shaft.

He pushed up and came back down. His erection scraped the floor, wakening him from the fantasy. He collapsed and rolled over with a groan.

It was all her fault that he was sexually famished, that his cock beat with heated blood. Now that he knew she wasn’t the enemy, he wanted to fuck her out of his system. He should've bent her over that table, pulled her pants off, spread her ass cheeks, and, from behind, slipped his tongue into her hot pussy.

He shoved his hand into his pants and grabbed his aching erection. He gave it a few tugs, cursing again for his loss of control. He wanted to punish her for her come-hither eyes and for making him want her so fucking bad. He should have pinned her shoulders to that table, pressing her firm breasts against the wood, trapped, untouchable by his hands. The way she liked her nipples pinched and pulled during foreplay, it'd drive her crazy, not being able to get what she wanted. He'd clutch her hips and pull that sweet ass of hers up high. Maybe he'd give it a few justifiable slaps before he plunged himself deep inside her.

The jerking of his cock heightened as the picture of screwing Nala from behind infected him. Her ass slapping wildly against his stiff body with each taking thrust, the sound of it, loud, was so real in his mind. In the solitude of his bedroom, Tantum stroked himself harder, faster as he growled out her name. His heart was racing. His muscles were tense and rigid, bulging beneath his perspiring flesh. He tried to slow down, but as he imagined himself claiming her, impaling his full throbbing rod inside her, he was unable to seize the overwhelming orgasm that had started to build.

Flashes of her crawling to him on all fours, sitting on top of him, her tight pussy stretching around his engorged cock. The vision infused his insatiable sexual appetite. It fed him and his erection. Her name slipped from his taut lips again. His hand slid down to his balls, he gave them a squeeze, and then he ran his hand up his tight shaft, desperately wishing it was Nala's hand fisted around his molten flesh. He yanked rigorously, his biceps on fire from the tension. Fast and frantic, he tugged on the growing explosion that was about to erupt.

“Fuck, Nala,” he groaned in agony. His ass muscles tensed and his hips matched the fluent movement of his aggressive strokes. “I want you so bad, sweetheart,” he called out, jerking violently on his straining erection. He shuddered with his release until he finally spilled his built up hostility all over his hand.

Shaking and catching his breath from the realization that he was not completely satisfied, Tantum cursed one last time. He wasn’t accustomed to resorting to jerking himself off. Normally when a woman got him hot and bothered, he had her and then carried on with his business. But his need for Nala had entered uncharted waters. He didn’t want to admit it, but he was afraid of her, of the way she surpassed the need for a quick roll in the hay. She had him thinking about things he didn’t want to think about… things like caring. The longer he was with her, the deeper the water was becoming.

But he was stuck with her, with the one woman who’d ever seriously threatened to break through the deadbolt he fixed on his heart.

Even if he wanted to, he couldn’t pick up his feet to run from her.

****

After showering for the second time that day, Tantum descended the stairs and found Nala sitting on the sofa with papers strewn around her. She gave him a fleeting glance and went on reading.

He sat down. He'd had time to think, time to work off the fury. “Listen,” he said, breaking her concentration. “We need to check out the Hotel Monaco and the motel at Niagara Falls, get a list of the guests, and look into any other nearby hotels. We need to check out gas stations, anyplace the bomber might have stopped.

“Fine,” she easily agreed. “Let’s get our AC’s on it now.”

“No. Somebody at NESA’s involved in this. Until we know who, the less anyone else knows, the better.”

She frowned. He saw how much it cost her to admit it was so, but at last she asked, “Do you have a laptop here?”

He got it from his bedroom, put it on the coffee table and switched it on.

“Here, let me see it.” She stretched out her arm to turn the computer toward her.

He chuckled at her assumption that he'd hand it over so easily. “No. I’ve been around awhile and can probably get into databases you can’t. I’ll print out what I find.” He typed in his password.

“Still don’t trust me?”

“Oh, I know you’re not the bomber.”

“That isn’t what I asked.”

He didn’t look up from the screen. “I don’t trust you not to risk yourself,” he admitted. “If we want this info, we’ve got no choice but to use NESA access. But if we’re being set up, someone could be monitoring our accounts. Better they think it’s me.”

“I can take care of myself. Maybe better yet if I get out of here and away from you.”

Another chuckle escaped him. “Go ahead and try,” he taunted. He watched her rise to her feet. “If you want to be handcuffed again.” He grinned as she eased back onto the sofa.

“You're an ass.” Her tone was scathing.

“I've been called worse.”

“Fine. Then you're an overbearing, beastly ogre!”

“Okay,
that
may be a new one.” He chortled.

“And I have no intention of occupying the same room with you.”

He shrugged. “Then go to the study, down the hall to the left. If I find anything, I’ll send it to the printer in there.”

****

Hours went by. Every so often the printer rolled out pages. Nala pored over them as they came, looking for duplication of names and any patterns that might pop out at her, but nothing looked out of the ordinary.

“I think we need a break,” he said, sticking his head through the doorway. “Maybe a bite to eat.”

Her stomach had growled earlier, but she didn’t want to stop. There were far too many unanswered questions. “Sure,” she said, not granting him a look. “Want me to make it?”

“No, I got it,” he said, then glared at her. “Nala,” he added in that annoyingly authoritative tone of his.

She pulled herself away from her list. “Yeah?”

He stood towering over her. “Where's your sling?”

She shrugged. “I don’t need it.” She hadn’t worn it during her escape attempt, afraid it would hinder her running, but he’d been too out of it to notice and she didn’t want to remind him of that. Instead, she smirked at him. “My shoulder doesn’t hurt much anymore. You must have done a good job of manipulating it.”

“Go get it and put it on,” he quarterbacked, minus the pads.

“No.”

A large hand came at her, and the strong fingers of that hand clamped onto her injured shoulder and slowly squeezed. She winced and shrugged away, getting his point. Her shoulder did still hurt, but she was damned if she’d let him know.

“Go get it,” he instructed again.

“I feel too restrained when I wear it.”

His eye twitched. His hands were fisted at his side, but he didn’t argue or retaliate. Instead, he went ominously calm and walked out of the room.

****

Evening turned to night and they were no closer to finding the bomber. Finally, Nala gave in to her exhaustion and slipped off to her bedroom. At least she’d get to wear her own pajamas instead of one of Tantum’s oversized t-shirts. Her soft flannel pants eased her body, and the fitted t-shirt, taut against her breasts, the outfit she’d worn a hundred times, made her feel sleepy, almost secure. Yet, for some reason, she missed being wrapped in his damn shirt.

She brushed her teeth and her hair, turned off the light, pulled back the blanket and wiggled between the comfortable sheets. In the dark, she saw in her mind the columns of names, dates and addresses, the snippets of factoids he’d turned up. Was the answer there at all? Sometimes inspiration occurred on the edge of sleep.

The bedroom door flew open. A dark silhouette stood blocking the light from behind. “Come on,” he said, his voice smooth but determined.

She sat up, alarmed. “Where? What’s going on?”

“I'm ready for bed, and you're staying in my room tonight.”

“The hell I am.” Still, the very thought tickled her with anticipation, and it only heightened when he took a step into the room, naked from the waist up, his muscles rippling in the low light.

“You don’t have a choice.” His raspy voice echoed in the dark room. The moon lit up half of his face. His expression was unyielding. “You refuse to listen to me, fight me at every turn, and I can't trust you when it comes to your safety. So tonight and every night until I say otherwise, you will not leave my sight. Get up and come on.”

“I’m sleeping here.” She plumped up the pillow, laid her head on it and closed her eyes.

Strong arms slipped around her, picked her up, and tossed her easily over his shoulder. She twisted, but he hauled her down the hall like a sack of potatoes.

“Neanderthal!” She tried to knee him in the kidney, and when she couldn’t reach it, bit his arm. He shook under her. Puzzlement turned to scalded pride as she realized he was laughing.

He lugged her into his bedroom, “Sweetheart, I'm going to swat you in the ass if you don’t behave.” Unceremoniously, he threw her onto the bed.

She sprang up on her hands, glaring at him through the long hair tumbled over her eyes. “You wouldn’t dare!”

He leaned down. His hands slithered along the mattress until one was on each side of her. “Try me.”

She pulled back. She believed him. He'd have no problem bending her over his knee and spanking her. The indignities should have made her despise him, she knew, but instead the humiliating image excited her strangely.
What is wrong with me? Can he see what I’m thinking?

This was intolerable. She rose from the bed. “I'm going back to my room. Get some sleep. Maybe it’ll put some manners back into you.”